Hollywood's New Nordic Migration

Telling stories slowly: More Scandinavian filmmakers are being lured to the U.S.

By

Rachel Dodes

Feb. 28, 2013 6:21 p.m. ET

When Swedish actress Noomi Rapace read the script for "Dead Man Down" written by Hollywood producer-screenwriter J.H. Wyman, she was immediately drawn to her character, a vendetta-fueled beautician of French extraction who is struggling with facial disfigurement after a car crash.

Then she heard that Niels Arden Oplev was in talks to direct it. "I really couldn't believe it," she says. She called Mr. Oplev to ask...